The organisations representing the school leaders and finance managers of many of the schools in Northern Ireland are releasing this joint statement to draw public attention to the critical situation facing all schools across Northern Ireland. The financial challenges facing every type of school are real, urgent, and will have a significant impact on the learning opportunities for current and future generations of pupils.

The finances distributed to schools have already been stretched to breaking point by successive cuts, and all reasonable, cost-reducing steps have been exhausted. This escalating crisis is confirmed by the fact that approximately 70% of schools in Northern Ireland are already in financial deficit. Without immediate and significant intervention, this figure will continue to rise. As highlighted in the Independent Review of Education, there is a need for considerable reform to secure efficiencies, however, the 2025-26 position is unprecedented, with the sector facing a forecast overspend of approximately £252 million just to meet inescapable and pre-committed pressures. Schools have found themselves in this crisis because of pressures totally outside their control - including increases to employer National Insurance contributions and cost-of-living pay rises for staff. With 82% of the total education budget locked into staff costs and 85-90% of a school’s budget allocated to staffing, there is virtually no scope for schools to absorb these deficits.

The proposed draft multi-year Budget for 2026-2029/30 is deemed by school leaders as completely unrealistic. We understand from a briefing by the Department of Education Permanent Secretary and senior colleagues that the proposed allocations would require the Department of Education to find massive savings over the next three years:

• £0.8 billion in 2026-27
• £1.01 billion in 2027-28
• £1.15 billion in 2028-29

To put this in perspective, the £0.8 billion required in the first year alone equates to almost half of the entire 2025-26 Aggregated Schools Budget (ASB). To achieve such targets, the Department of Education would be forced to make approximately 6,700 teachers and 3,100 non-teaching staff redundant - a move that would itself require an additional £510 million in dedicated redundancy funding just to implement.

We believe these financial pressures will lead to dramatic reductions in the quality of frontline classroom provision and major, unrecoverable deficits, which are already predicted to range from £150,000 to over £1 million per school. If these proposals proceed, the consequences for pupils will include:

• Significantly larger class sizes and an increase in non-specialist teachers delivering the curriculum.
• A potentially shorter school day or shorter school week.
• Poorer learning environments with deep cuts to maintenance, resources, and technical support. Exacerbating the ‘systemic failure’ of the estate identified by the NI Audit Office (2024) and the Assembly's Public Accounts Committee (PAC) Inquiry, leaving pupils in crumbling classrooms with no budget for essential repairs.
• The collapse of essential services, including the Executive’s Early Learning and Childcare Scheme.

Northern Ireland Education is at a crossroads. We call on the Northern Ireland Executive to recognise that the proposed multi-year budget is unsustainable for Education and must be changed to protect and invest in the future of our country. Our priority must be to invest in the future of our children rather than managing the decline of our schools. We urge all stakeholders - parents, staff and the wider public - to engage with the Department of Finance’s budget consultation before the 3 March 2026 deadline. It is vital that a collective message is sent that this budget is unacceptable for our children’s future.